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Verizon Loses Suit Over Subpoena of Subscriber Info
Brian Golden writes "As a result of a suit filed by the RIAA, the identity of a Verizon customer with a penchant for mp3's was ordered to be released. Man, how many people are now sweating bullets trying to remember what they downloaded?" News.com.com also has a story. If you've forgotten about this case, see our earlier story. Verizon wasn't making any sort of principled stand to protect its users' privacy, it just wanted to avoid the costs of complying with the (many) subpoenas it will now receive.
It wasnt me, it was my brother/son/wife/cousin/neighbor/someone-using-my- WAP
The power's concentrated in the hands of the copyright holders, who have the money and the control. The DMCA was passed because they wanted it; the Verizon motion was decided this way because they wanted it...a w/
http://www.geocities.com/digitalmilleniuml
geek. lawyer.
At least Verizon had the balls to stand against the RIAA... too bad they lost...
This is my sig. Its pathetic.
Just delete the logs daily or even hourly.
Then you don't have anything to turn over. Of course, then you can't charge customers extra for bandwidth, but you can't win everything....
Stop keeping logs of users. Just issue DHCP at random and be done with it.
Life is the leading cause of death in America.
The sad thing is none of those slaughtered pigs work for the RIAA.
~D:
This guy downloaded over 600 songs in a day! If and only if this behavior was not limited to a single day, then it is obvious this guy was pirating music. He took music without paying for it, plain and simple.
Of course, if he owned the CDs, that is a different story, but the probability of the guy (it has to be a guy!) owning those CDs just isn't there.
Rename all your shared P2P ZIPs/ISOs/RARs/etc to "filename-ext.mp3" and let the RIAA wade throught the flood of "mp3" files.
Trolling is a art,
What if someone launches a large scale DDoS attach from their netblock? You'd think they'd like to be aware of it...
Pigs are certainly more intelligent than you! Lets start eating trolls instead!
Trolls! The other white meat!
Let me get this straight.
We now live in a world where anonymity no longer exists, we have to pay for music, and an ugly 18 year old Canadian chick is at the top of the US music charts?
I need a Tums...
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
>Just to enjoy the transient pleasure of tasting their flesh?
Yes.
Mmmmmm. bacon.
This means that the (MP|RI)AA can serve as many goddamn subpoenas as they want and the ISP's lawyers will advise them to comply in light of this decision. The next logical step is for the (MP|RI)AA to serve cease and desist letters to individuals... then lawsuits will result if they don't comply.
Many people involved in this will agree that it's probably time for the (MP|RI)AA to start working on consumer dis-satisfaction... if they start to sue individuals, things will get very bad.
I mean, come one RIAA!
You're infringing on our rights now. I can't wait till there's a supreme court case against the RIAA and they get their assess sued off and can't survive any longer.
This is also just a stupid marketing ploy. Just wait until tonite and tomorrow all of the major TV stations and radio will be talking this all up.
riaaPublicity++
Serves him right, that loser downloaded Justin Timberlake's new CD. Can't do that without SOME kind of repercussions, and it's either the RIAA or Satan, right? I say choose the lesser evil.
using namespace slashdot;
troll::post();
MEMORANDUM OPINION
The Recording Industry Association of America ("RIAA") has moved to enforce a subpoena served on Verizon Internet Services ("Verizon") under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 ("DMCA" or "Act"), 17 U.S.C. 512. On behalf of copyright owners, RIAA seeks the identity of an anonymous user of Verizon's service who is alleged to have infringed copyrights with respect to more than 600 songs downloaded from the Internet in a single day. The copyright owners (and thus RIAA) can discern the Internet Protocol address, but not the identity, of the alleged infringer -- only the service provider can identify the user. Verizon argues that the subpoena relates to material transmitted over Verizon's network, not stored on it, and thus falls outside the scope of the subpoena power authorized in the DMCA. RIAA counters that the subpoena power under section 512(h) of the DMCA applies to all Internet service providers, including Verizon, whether the infringing material is stored on or simply transmitted over the service provider's network.
The case thus presents a core issue of statutory interpretation relating to the scope of the subpoena authority under the DMCA. The parties, and several amici curiae, agree that this is an issue of first impression of great importance to the application of copyright law to the Internet. Indeed, they concede that this case is presented as a test case on the DMCA subpoena power.Based on the language and structure of the statute, as confirmed by the purpose and history of the legislation, the Court concludes that the subpoena power in 17 U.S.C. 512(h) applies to all Internet service providers within the scope of the DMCA, not just to those service providers storing information on a system or network at the direction of a user. Therefore, the Court grants RIAA's motion to enforce, and orders Verizon to comply with the properly issued and supported subpoena from RIAA seeking the identity of the alleged infringer.
The recording industry asked Verizon last summer to reveal the name of a customer believed to have downloaded more than 600 songs in one day, but Verizon refused
(Emph mine.) So just based on the fact that the customer might have downloaded [any number] of songs, they have convinced the federal government to step in and force Verizon to release information to a group of record companies? This is revolting.
My ISP is too dumb to know who had was doing what. They cant even tell me if my connection is working properly. I dont expect that they will be able to know what I downloaded
Why does it matter whether it was some principle or some cost cutting measure? I would think they would fight more to save some money than to uphold some code of ethics.
Ok.
What happens if, say, I have my MP3 collection on my computer at home. I get permission to temporarily use the storage at work while doing a reformat of my computer. When I download all the files back to my computer at home, is the RIAA going to come knocking?
Two choices: encrypt the entire collection or re-rip from CD. I don't know which would take longer.
...
Then again, this looks like a publicity stunt by the RIAA et. al. Keep pissing people off, and see what happens.
Cops not amused at drunk hacker's smiley Weird News
Johnny Cochrane: It does not make sense. Look at me. I'm a lawyer defending a major record company and I'm talkin' about Chewbacca. Does that make sense? Ladies and Gentlemen I'm am not making any sense. None of this makes sense. And so you have to remember when you're in that jury room deliberating and conjugating the Emancipation Proclamation, does it make sense? No. Ladies and Gentlemen of this deposed jury it does not make sense. If Chewbacca lives on Endor you must acquit. The defense rests.
Does the RIAA have the power to hamstring this guy now? Turn him into an example? The Reuters article was a little short on information. I'd like to see a followup on this.
;)
It's nice to see a company stand up against these dicks, even if it is one of my employer's competitors.
~D:
Jeez.. come on, you think they are going to go after your little brother for downloading Weird Al recordings?
hrm.. maybe they will...
But I doubt it. However, they are using tactics like these to scare people, and it is working (the comment about sweating in the main post) and that is ridiculous.
We need a good encrypted filesharing app, with each box running it using a PGP key which is publically available *offshore* somewhere.. This could all be automated of course.
grumble
anime+manga together at last.. in real time.
Chris Rhea...
Diarrhea...
Chris Rhea...
Diarrhea...
And again.
Chris Rhea...
Diarrhea...
A federal judge ordered Verizon Communications Tuesday to turn over the name of a customer suspected of downloading songs over the Internet, handing a victory to recording companies in their fight against online piracy.
But what if I start my own ISP and the database of customer records is indexed without any information that would be able to identify the person or phone line that's dialing in to use our Web access services?
Any payment information would be done with cash only and written on pencil and paper kept in a lockbox or safe of some sort so that no matter what a court rules, my customers remain anonymous.
Is this feasible?
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
Mentions that John Doe was accused of sharing over 600 files. I guess that would make a little more sense for them to go after him. I can't imagine that trying to go after everyone who has downloaded mp3's would be economically feasible. Especially since they would have to 1) prove that the downloader didn't own the cd, 2) prove that the mp3 was actually a copywritten song (it could easily be a homework assignment with an odd filename. Those are two hurdles off of the top of my head that would probably throw a wrench into any attempt to prosecute. Likely this is more of an RIAA bid to scare ISP's into trying to crack down on use of P2P apps over their networks.
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
This is the real cost to the ISP. Dealing with each of these requests, changing their log scripts, and handing over the data.
If the subpoena is particularly broad and the ISP is large, a subpoena can mean keeping gigabytes of data that the ISP would normally send to /dev/null.
--Pat
Either that, or let's start a class-action lawsuit against the RIAA for unauthorized wiretaps. Are there any tech-savvy lawyers out there? There has to be something we can all sue them for. Two can play at this game.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
Can this guy just go out and buy all the CD's he had downloaded the songs from and claim that he did not know how to rip the CD's into MP3's...so instead he downloaded them?
IGB: More fun than eating oatmeal!
Does a Kazaa server keep logs for the RIAA to look at? Then how can they accuse him of downloading the songs?
Rip. Mix. Burn.
Has been superceded by
Track. Subpoena. Litigate.
Which had damn well better begotten by
Boycott. RIAA. NOW.
The ONLY way to get them to shut the hell up and off our backs, is to make sure their sales suck long after file-trading has been smacked-down.
~~~
"The slave thinks he is released from bondage, only to find a stronger set of chains" - NIN
It's not enough that they're screwing us with album prices. Now they're going to make ISPs hire more people so they can support one-offs on people moving pirated music over the internet, which means my ISP bill will probably raise to compensate for it.
I know they just wanted that one guy who downloaded 600 songs in a day, but c'mon, once they sue and jail all the big downloaders, they'll go after the little girls downloading singles off of Kazaa. (or whatever crap-ass P2P app is popular at the time)
I propose a cash only, recordless DSL ISP. In our customer agreement we specifically state that people may pay by cash, or money order, and even if they do pay with credit cards, no records will be kept, beyond, payment received for modem #12345. No customer names are ever to be kept. Why do I care what your name is, all that matters to me is that you pay your bill, all that matters to you is that your DSL modem works. For obvious reasons, no outgoing port 25 traffic allowed, otherwise this could be spammer heaven. Customers would have to submit payment along with the uniq number identifying thier DSL modem. That keeps the modem on for another month. Once the transaction is verified, no records are retained, and we never link IP address to DSL modem. Maybe we implement a daily rotating DHCPd IP scheme for good measure. Supeona my business records? sure, here's 100000 cash receipt stubs with no names, have a ball.
So suppose the black helicopters land on my front lawn and the feds/RIAA/MPAA start breaking down my door? Is there an instant method for wiping all my disks (assume I've got secret off-site backups)? Thermite bomb on top of the CPU? Other ideas? You've got to figure that you'll only get seconds of warning at best...
600? That's it? When I was serving MP3s in IRC a few years back, there were some users serving over 10000 songs a piece.
Here's hoping they stay away from IRC... at least for a little while :P.
Also, here's a link to the full text of the Judge's ruling. Feel free to Slashdot the RIAA site :D.
I guess this means I can use the DMCA to force ISPs to give me the IDs of people whose machines have sent me spam. Since there's no due process involved, nor (seemingly) any right to appeal (at least by the ISP, and there doesn't seem to be a provision for user to appeal), I should be able to find out who they are, where they live, and their phone number.
What happens then? Use your imagination.
But what's the DMCA violation with spamming? The spammer has bypassed the technological measures installed on my machine (spam filters) preventing me from copying (receiving) their spam. Remember, the courts don't review this, so I can get their personal info just by asking.
Here, spammer...
Just run an open WiFi connection and say it's someone else!
I am not a number! I am a man! And don't you
I don't buy music often. I would like to know, and I'm sure many of you reading this board can help with this; is there a simple way to know if a particular artist is affiliated with the RIAA?
Wh47 d1d j00 541, 31337 15n't t3h r0xor5 ne m0r3???
rename all the linux rpms to mp3's and download whole distributions at a time.
I'm currently downloading the latest redhat beta - all 2 Gb of it on verizon dsl. Could be great fun to break it up into several megabyte chunks, rename them all to be "justin-n-celine.mp3" and the like, and see what happens.
Just cuz a file is named "mp3" doesn't mean it is one and just cuz it isnt named "mp3" doesnt mean it isnt one.
The president of the RIAA says:
.mp3s (or oggs), for relatively cheap (e.g. $.25 a track...) I have not been educated or informed of a legitimate alternative to peer networks.
"The illegal distribution of music on the Internet is a serious issue for musicians, songwriters and other copyright owners, and the record companies have made great strides in addressing this problem by educating consumers and providing them with legitimate alternatives."
I am interested in legal methods of attaining high-quality, non restricted use
Exactly what strides have they been making? What alteratives are they giving us?
Anything you write down, record on tape, commit to a file on your computer, or store in any way other than in the meat between your ears can come back to haunt you.
Verizon should make sure they log as little as possible - keep IP to User ID logs for not more than a day, don't log ANY actions of your proxy servers, and so on.
Then, when the *AA comes and says "We need all your logs for the past week so we can find this pirate", Verizon can say "Here's all the logs we have - the last 23 hours. Cheers!"
If you absolutely feel you must have the possiblity of accessing logs older than that, then encrypt them with a public key. Let the private key be held by an individual in another country. If you need to access the logs, you mail the encrypted log to him, he decrypts it and sends it back.
Then if you are served, you give the logs to the nice officers, and then tell your friend that you have been served. Then, even if you want the logs decrypted, your friend won't.
Let them go to East Elbonia if they want the logs decrypted.
www.eFax.com are spammers
I don't see how that's possible. That means 25 songs an hour, which is like a song every two minutes. Assuming you've got a broadband connection with the bandwidth to download a song in 2 minutes, how do you go about finding someone else willing to serve it at that rate, every two minutes? And on top of that, wading through all the corrupted (some by RIAA) songs and dealing with servers that crap out, not to mention staying up all night (can you put 200 songs in your queue? will they all download?). I just don't see how it's possible. They might as well just say he was downloading a gajillion songs a day.
I wonder if things like this make people afraid to download songs from legal sources, like my own site. And what about things like Emuisc? Do they assume every mp3 is illegally gotten?
c-hack.com |
Isn't this what "we" wanted?
I (and many others) have said in the past that we were ticked at the RIAA for praposing blanket clauses to prevent piracy, often resulting in the demolition of fair use. Often the war cry was something along the lines of "go after the pirates, not the technology" or "Don't introduce new draconian laws, use the ones available now (copyright infringement is a crime already)". Now they start doing this and I'm even more concerned/disgusted....
devil's advocate, I know...
----rhad
Slashdot needs to interview Natalie Portman.
"The illegal distribution of music on the Internet is a serious issue for musicians, songwriters and other copyright owners, and the record companies have made great strides in addressing this problem by educating consumers and providing them with legitimate alternatives."
Am I missing something? What alternative are they talking about? I thought after Napster was shutdown that Kazaa was the alternative.
RIAASpeak:
"The illegal distribution of music on the Internet is a serious issue for musicians, songwriters and other copyright owners. . ."
The "other" copyright owners are the record companies. In fact, I'm sure the record companies are the only copyright owners most of the time--but it's a lot easier to stick up for the rights of a well-known (or not) musician, than it is to stick up for the rights of a faceless, multi-billion-dollar corporation.
Seriously--if artists owned any share of the copyright after their CD hit the market, do you think we'd see the flood of remade songs that are on the airwaves today?
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
Sadly, the average broadband dorm-dwelling college student could, if s/he had enough storage space, download 600 songs in 20 seconds.
Just imagine what they could get in an hour of work.
Unfortunately, it's not uncommon for many college students to have hundreds of GigaBytes of MP3 songs that they did not pay for. It's all too confusing, and most students don't even understand what they're doing is wrong.
I help with freshman arrival and computer orientation for them, and 90% of them have a first question of "How do I download MP3s?".
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
www.freeswan.ca
Transfer it all over IPsec. People should use it a lot more.
Get your own free personal location tracker
I almost feel bad for the **AA's - they seem to have no idea how badly the entire file-sharing community is going to want to f00k them over for this. And now that we're all criminals on the lam from the RIAA, who knows what we'd be willing to do???
BTW, in freenet this type of persecution would be nearly impossible.
I've got my helmet on - you can't tell me I'm not in space.
Let's change the extension on everything to mp3 and make it a point to transfer 100+ titles a day of whatever *.mp3 files you can find.
Let the RIAA sort that one out.
Shop smart, Shop S-Mart.
Now, the RIAA has a name they can take to court. They will be suing a person for illegal activities. They are not suing Verizon for providing the bandwidth. They are not suing Kazaa for providing the service. They are suing the individual who broke the law.
Isn't that what we wanted all along? That the RIAA and MPAA would sue the individual infringers and leave the networks alone?
I can't say that I don't give a fuck. I've just run out of fuck to give.
Sure it is not as fast as the P2P clients, but it is slowly getting there. The more poeple use it the better it will get.
I'll say it again - it's not Verizon's Fault
A court has ruled that they are legally bound to provide the information - if they do not provide it they will be acting illegally.
Whether Verizon choose to fight it from a consumer protection issue, or so that they were not open to a flood of court actions it is no longer in thier hands.
So they did stand up to it - and they lost.
It is not a customer service issue - its a matter of law - they have no choice.
If the bad law upsets you write your congresscritter - I can't because I'm not a US resident.
"Your Deteriorating Rights On-line" or "Your On-line Rights Deteriorating" or "Your Rights Deteriorating On-line" or...you get the point.
HAHAHAHHAHHAHAHAHHHAHA
ahHAH
H
h
aH
Ah
wow that was funny.
The person was sharing 600 songs, not downloading them. One would have to wiretap in order to find one downloading. All they did was look at the users share list.
I wish people would stop using SHARING and DOWNLOADING interchangeably - they are not the same thing, and DOWNLOADING is being erroneously used everywhere I see it.
It does not matter what you do, it's wrong.
...in a long sequence of events that will lead to the MPAA and RIAA losing in the long run. Laws are only valid when they are accepted by those they police, no matter what the consequences. My friends don't really know anything about copyright and the DMCA or the trojans various p2p systems have installed on their machines. All they know is that they can get music for free without having to tune a radio or visit the Mecca of copyright abuse, the library.
But when the big kids start subopenaing(sp?) their personal info, because of excessive p2p transactions, they will realize big brother is watching. You can bet some serious fall-out would happen if average people were subjected to that scrutiny.
In a way this verdict is a good thing, but only if the collusion factorys are dumb and aggressive enough to actually abuse it. In the end some arbitrary penalty will exist and once in a while you will see an example made, but everyone will just go on getting what they want while the law looks the other way.
Spend Money! Support Terrorism! Freedom for Nick and Bart!
An RIAA "artist" takes a chord progression and melody that's been "written" and recorded over and over again, and then RIAA sues someone for copying it? Ridiculous.
Remember when George Harrison was convicted of "copyright infringment" for the song, "My Sweet Lord" - it had the chord progression and melody of an older song, "He's So Fine". The judge ruled that if every 7th note was the same, it could be copyright infringment.
Remember when John Fogerty (the former lead singer of Creedence Clearwater Revival) was sued for sounding like himself? The record company claimed that they owned the "sound" of CCR, and John Fogerty's solo album sounded like, well, himself. How can anyone take this crap seriously?
If I never buy CDs, and I copy music from my friend who does buy CDs, what has the RIAA lost? Nothing. So how is it stealing?
The fact that people are seriously saying that a "corporation" can "own" a song just shows how far newspeak has progressed.
Is he going to be charged with unauthorized possession of electrons in a particual sequence? Will he be charged with attacking ships on the high seas?
The fact that Michael Jackson's company "owns" Beatles songs is theft IMO.
I wonder which people on slashdot are being paid to spread this "sharing is stealing" meme, and more importantly, how can I sign up?
There are two types of people; those who divide people into two types of people, and those who don't.
But now, with this one-two punch aimed at ISPs (see http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/01/18/21 16255&mode=thread&tid=141)they've started annoying the big boys - corporations with real money. No ISP in their right mind wants to have to give up their user's personal info without a fight - it makes them look bad and generates a lot of bad will with their customers.
So might it be that Verizon, AT&T, BellSouth, Earthlink, etc. will start some counter-lobbying on the Hill to get the DMCA limited? Sure, they're not really doing it for the best reasons... but you know what they say about "the enemy of my enemy."
next thing you know your mom's gonna be able to get a log of how much pron you downloaded
slashdot, news for crazed liberal socialist zealots
The Globe and Mail also has an article about this.
Check out the scary "John Doe" clause.
-- clvrmnky
Look, I know you all are bitching about the RIAA and Verizon and how the government is favoring the RIAA. What is really going on here is the judge is simply complying with the DMCA. This case was never about the validity of the DMCA as much as it was a clarity on a line. The real problem here is that DMCA was the most horrible piece of legislation this country has ever passed into law, and i'm suprised it hasn't been challenged yet. All the problems we've seen over intellectual property are the result of that stupid document. It's funny too, because everyone blindly supported it when it was first being written. I think the EFF group was the only one against it and for reasons unforseen at the time.
I mean, it's pretty obvious what the outcome of the decision was going to be. Who has the big bucks? A massive media monopoly versus an ISP? Hmm, that's a difficult one.
The alleged user was not sharing 600 files, he downloaded 600 distinct files. As to how RIAA came up with that number, I presume they must have 'shared' a good amount of stuff and that particular person just so happen to have downloaded A LOT of stuff from them in order to see what was uploaded from their treasure chest.
The articles linked are relatively short on details, but I did glean the fact that the individual is *suspected* by the RIAA of downloading music. 600 sounds like one of the RIAAs made up numbers, but it doesnt matter.
So, some girl blew you off on ICQ? Got her IP? Want her real life name and info? Sure, send an official looking letter to her ISP and say you 'suspect' her of downloading your stuff. Want to harrass some kid because he likes PS2 and not XBox? Same deal.
I hope you LEOs are paying attention. See that kid on IRC talking about smoking a joint? Want his real name and address? Here you go.
This marks the end of privacy online.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
The end result is that they were fighting for something many of us value. The US legal system is still heavily based on common law which means that a precedent set here would help us. Once again the ignorance of many "geeks" and "nerds" is astounding. It never ceases to amaze me how many take a "principled stand" yet don't have the balls to do anything themselves. I bet most of Verizon's critics on this issue can't even get off their dead asses and write their Congress(man || woman) on issues they rant and rave about on /.
Go ahead, call me a troll and label my post flamebait. I at least write my congresscritter on a regular basis and am one of the few in my area that has the balls to call out my representative in public on issues I believe in. I have confronted him before in front of a large body of people on the DMCA, a bill he is very proud of having been involved with.
It's pathetic how loud and shrill the bitching of slashdot's resident armchair revolutionaries can get.
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
Great. It isn't enough that RIAA taxes blank media, now they are taxing ISP's by increasing the ISP's costs, and thus the price we pay for internet service.
It's starting to look like RIAA is a world wide government. I wonder if if RIAA has nukes, and if Blix is going to inspect them.
Oh wait. They do have a nuke. It's called DMCA.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
I don't think the RIAA would even know this was happening. Now if you just blew away your MP3s and redownloaded them from a host controlled by RIAA and they could gather that traffic data, then you might have a problem.
so, go buy the cd's for the songs you have mp3s for and then you have the legal right to have the mp3s, or burn them down to CD and hide them, or get an account at havenco adn keep your mp3s there. I like to see the RIAA inforce a supena with Sea Haven.
Have you ever wondered if it's possible to set up a competitor for the record companies that comprise the RIAA? Say... if you had the billions of $$ that Bill Gates has and you decided you just wanted to f*ck with the RIAA, you could set up a large-scale online music distribution system, a marketing arm to promote artists, and a recruiting arm to bring the talent into your agency. You could then proceed to just beat the RIAA in their own market.
I suppose this could fail on two counts: a) there's no way to be profitable on the same scale as the RIAA without protecting your assets through the same tactics they're currently using (which I doubt most of us believe) or b) to have the Gates-type bucks to do this you have to be such an unscrupulous bastard that you'd be no better than the RIAA anyway.
Well, this sure as hell is going to piss off Verizon. As mentioned in previous posts, this will generate a real cost for them. As time goes on, and the RIAA goes after other ISPs for user information, the ISPs will all get pissed. Maybe they'll form the ISPAA (internet service provider ass. of america).
Maybe the RIAA will find that no one is willing to provide them bandwidth. Maybe the P2P programs will purposefully begin blocking access to various RIAA-owned IP addresses.
It's one thing to protect your copyright and it's another thing COMPLETELY to strongarm others into doing your dirty work.
I will never buy another major-label CD again. I love a lot of artists, but I love my personal freedoms more.
This is:
1.An attempt, and order BY the government to uphold the will of a corporation, above and beyond that of the citizens. Therefore:
2.A hostile act by the government against the citizens of this nation.
--otterpop378
That's the point. The RIAA wants to know whenever someone transfers music over the internet.
They just got a subpoena for Verizon, to find out who the downloader was. Can you see where this road goes?
...
If the RIAA doesn't know who the person is, how do they know the person unlawfully downloaded the music? That person may be legally entitled to possess copies of those 600 tracks as they may already own the CDs. For all they know, this person may be a record company employee!
I certainly feel I am doing nothing wrong if I download tracks I already own on CD, and I certainly own right to play more than 600 tracks. More like 6000!
The next step will be for the RIAA to force Slashdot to hand over the names of people who have posted items expressing extreme dislike of the RIAA because they are "probable downloaders". NAZI Germany, here we come.
Strategy 1: Shut down the sites that provide the software. Spend millions in the process.
Result: Another site springs up and takes over the 'mainstream' market. Napster > Audiogalaxy > KaZaa > ?
Strategy 2: Impose a blanket surcharge on internet access assuming that everyone downloads music
Result: Uproar from the public were it to be put in place as the majority of internet users dont download music. Paying the 'music industry' for the privalege of accessing the internet is effectivley stealing from the users.
Strategy: Sue individual users.
Result: For every one user proscecuted there are still millions sharing their files worldwide. Net effect: 0
You would think they would take a hint?
According to what I read in the complaint, the DMCA authorizes a publisher to subpoena the identity of an alleged copyright infringer. "...RIAA believed a computer on Verizon's internet service was distributing to the public for download unauthorized copies of hundreds of copyrighted sound recordings..."
Was the verizon subscriber targeted because he was downloading RIAA music files, or because he was publishing (offering for download) RIAA music files?
Enquiring minds want to know? I expect a retraction (or a re-write) of the Reuters quote any time now. I suspect the RIAA FUD campaign is working too well, inadvertently causing some journalist with average integrity to because a part of their FUD engine. Can a publisher assert copyright infringment charges against a posessor (rather than a publisher) of an unauthorized copy of a copyrighted work?
The thing about things we don't know is we often don't know we don't know them.
So a few other replies that have nothing to do with this article get "funny"s, and mine doesn't?
I know my observation wasn't that funny but it was hardly OT.
~D:
Wouldn't it be funny if all the file were fake? Ie they either used that Kazaa cheating program which makes it seem like you have more files then you do, or they just renamed some text files Brittney_Spear_mp3.
:-). Actually she said they were both very nice, and she mentioned to the RIAA guy about downloading music. The one thing he said besides explaining about some madeup revenue losses is that in the coming year aka now, the RIAA was going to go full tilt against private citizens who share their files on peer2peer programs. Now I know this is a big "no shit", but this was from someone in the thick of it and he said suits against individuals was going to become VERY common as opposed to suits against just the networks. So take it FWIW, but if your still sharing mp3's on Kazaa etc you may be in for more than you bargined for.
Also true story. My girlfriend was at a wedding recently in Washington(I couldn't make it). On both sides of her were two lawyers. One worked for MS the other for the RIAA. She said they were lucky I wasn't there
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
I'm sure they're only going to knock on the filesharer's door, and politely say "Excuse me, what you did was illegal, please don't do it again. As a token of our appreciation, here's a LEGITIMATE CD of Justin Timberlake...we seem to have plenty of these leftover."
Even if they left themselfs on 24/7 I kind of find it hard to believe that downloaded 600 songs each day.
I think it maybe our mathematically challenged friends at RIAA who made up this number. For all we know they could be the ones claming and spreading their logic that broadband equals 600 songs a day.
If ISPs could blocked outbound port 25 traffic from residential ... users
Then how will a user be able to send e-mail using both the home account and the work account?
Will I retire or break 10K?
Some sort of accountability must exist on the internet, just as it does in other forms of communication (phone, broadcast). If someone were making prank calls to a corporation from a phone, it's perfectly reasonable that said company be able to take action against them. The same would hold true if a person were broadcasting a pirate radio station. Noone would shed a tear if the FCC tracked them down at the request of the legitimate companies. We must compromise certain things to live in a civilized society.
We always talk about how the RIAA shouldn't be sueing providers, but sueing the pirates themselves.
Well now they're doing it. Let's not get our panties knotted when the RIAA actually follows the correct legal/moral path in their struggle to survive.
Besides, I sure as hell don't recall reading any privacy guarantees in my cable modem contract.
So what is this great cooperative ISP called? How do we join? Can we get DSL in southern California?
In recent weeks I have had KaZaa open 24/7 for sharing. Not 600 files, I share over 3000 files, simply to thumb my nose at these zealots.
With this said, let us take into consideration a suit by the RIAA against me, given that they get my name and information. A cease and desist letter? Sure, I'd probably cease, but what if I continued to share?
I'm a senior in college. I own a crappy car, rent an apartment, and have quite low income. So what then? What will they get if they sue me? Nearly nothing. They can have my student loan, my car, and my apt. Kick me off my ISP, I'll find another.
The RIAA seems to not understand that civil lawsuits mean nothing to those who have nothing. This means most college students. This means most of the file sharers.
Do you think I'd be downloading all the free music I want if I could afford it? (Yes, probably, but I'm just making a point)
Are [Microsoft] getting into Broadband now?
MSN 8 Broadband. Sign up today!.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Why don't they read in a dictionary the definitions of "offtopic" and "troll"? The parent post is, very obviously, a TROLL. "Offtopic" would be, for instance, a post about the MPAA, since the story was about the RIAA.
Sadly, the average broadband dorm-dwelling college student could, if s/he had enough storage space, download 600 songs in 20 seconds.
Making shit up may work for tps12's when he trolls, but at least he tends to keep it believable.
I've found that pork tastes especially delicious cooked on the grill. Don't forget to baste with Kraft BBQ (Original or Spicey are the best, I think) sauce approximately 20 minutes before it's done cooking. Goes great with some corn on the cob (also cooked on the grill - wrap in tin foil, grill for ~15 minutes) on the side. Hope that helps!
You want to access your MP3 anywhere. To do this, you place all your MP3s on a password protected server so that only you have access to them. If you listen to music all day, you will likely download over 600 songs. This is perfectly legal since they're your songs, but you'll be incriminated by the RIAA.
BTW: "sky.isFalling() = True" should be "sky.isFalling = true" or "sky.isFalling() == true" or even "sky.setFalling(true)".
Free Java games for your phone: Tontie, Sokoban
"Now that the court has ordered Verizon to live up to its obligation under the law, we look forward to contacting the account holder whose identity we were seeking so we can let them know that what they are doing is illegal."
RIAA : Now we know that you didn't know that all of this was illegal, so we're not going to press charges, sue you, or suck every last penny out of your lifeless corpse that we can under (over?) the law. We're just friendly people who want the best for the consumers!
Yeah, right...
One should really be asking, why in hell would Verizon even have captured that information in the first place? If they didn't have the information, they couldn't be forced to turn it over.
As to the subpoena, how can they get a subpoena to gain information about a customer who may have done nothing wrong? I hold in my hand a box of CDR marked "CD-R DA", "Digital Audio", "for Music Use". I've paid an extra tax that goes right to the music industry because they expect me to use these CDRs to record copyrighted audio onto them. How can I be doing anything that merits a subpoena and invades my privacy if they have already accepted my money based on the expectation I will record music on these CDRs?
I hope his isn't the only wave of Subpoenas that Verizon is dreading. I sure want to see the subpoenas flooding in when people want to know why the hell Verizon snooped on their Internet use and logged this.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
So, does that make it OK? It's OK that Verizon failed, and that the RIAA will take a bite out of people's right to privacy because, so says you, "they were greedy, evil profiteers & out for the almighty dollar anyway" ?
Wow, this sounds just like the media outlets in Atlas Shrugged. It sickens me to the core to hear about this. I mean, the REAL problem is what's going to happen to Verizon customers now and how their rights are about to be trampled on. There is NO reason you had to tell us that Verizon is evil anyway, so whatever they do they're damned.
Your digs are getting under my skin, michael, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. Instead of inciting people against Verizon and fanning the fuel of hatred for profiteers, maybe you should try telling people what they should really be doing is CANCELLING THEIR VERIZON ACCOUNTS.
Vote with your dollar rather than screaming soundlessly into a dark hole.
i'm amazed that i survived - an airbag saved my life.
One point, without comment on the legal issues raised by Judge Bates's ruling:
I wonder what the significance of 600 songs per day could be. The RIAA selected this user, presumably in order to make an example of someone. I can think of a few scenarios in which downloading 600 songs in one day would (1) not require too much effort; and (2) not reflect the sort of commercial theft that clearly exceeds the scope of fair use.
The average dorm-room music afficionado, enjoying broadband access for the first time in his life thanks to the college network, for example, might be trying to find mp3s of all of his favorite songs, some owned on CD, others not. This is a far different case from the person downloading massive numbers of files with the intention of creating bootleg mixes for commercial sale.
Does this signal an intention to begin legal action against pure consumers of music, and, if so, is the frequency of this downloader's Kazaa use representative of: (1) the minimum needed to garner the RIAA's attention; (2) an average use of Kazaa, as calculated by the RIAA in order to strike fear into the heart of the average person who shares music files; or (3) a heavy user who the RIAA would presume to be beyond any colorable fair use defense?
600 in RIAA terms actually means 222.3277909738717339667458432304
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/12/15/175
My new thing now is to hit the flea markets. I buy up every album that interests me on tape or LP (and sometimes CD if the price is right) for 50 cents to 5 bucks a piece. Thus, if I have the "Right of Time Shifting" under the Copyright Act's fair use section, then it is perfectly within my right to download a copy off of Limewire to us ein my MP3 player.
Beyond that if RIAA ever decides they want to collect for anything that I don't actually own on LP, Casette or CD, my defense will be that I've already been charged for selections in their "compilations" (i.e. songs I didn't want on many of the albums I bought) that I've already overpaid for their music.
Yeah, it probably won't fly, but my sense is that it will bring enough negative exposure that RIAA might just settle with me. :)
-A
I thought they'd be happy that the RIAA wanted to buy that customer's personal calling history: Verizon Sues to Stop Privacy Rules; Wants to Sell Call Data - can't they make up their mind?!
- passion
you people seem to think that just because something is in a digital format, it should be free. Sorry, but downloading music you haven't purchased is still stealing, and you know it. There is no justification.
Does anyone else think the subject size limit worked out REALLY funny this time?
...
I think that by "600 songs in one day" they meant 12 Doors songs.
"Pirates" are people who steal ships at sea. Copyright violators are people who publish other people's works. What constitutes publishing is open to debate. Kazaa and the like don't meet my criteria.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
How about you quit being such a troll?
If this decision holds up under appeal, it could very well stop ISPs from ignoring users that swap files over P2P networks. If ISPs know the copyright cartel is going to come at them with subpoenas every time they want to make an example of an MP3 trader, then they may start banning programs such as KaZaA and Morpheus from use on their networks. Why put up with the constant threats of the hijacker when it's easier to shoot the hostage?
And if that starts happening, how much more will CD sales plunge? I think it's grand entertainment, watching the music industry kill itself in an attempt to save itself. =^)
Don't forget to support indie music. Listen to more Solomon Burke.
Visit me on the web at Permanent4.com.
Since others already mentioned the simple fact that the RIAA doesn't create any music, I won't be (-1, Redundant). I don't want to bash the RIAA uselessly, that organization actually has contributed something of value to humanity. Around 1950 each record manufacturing company had their own standards for the frequency response curve they cut into their records. The best pre-amplifiers had a half-dozen or so settings, one for each type of record. The RIAA standardized that in a single curve, so, for the last forty years, any amplifier with a magnetic phono input has had a single setting for all records.
Having stated that simple (+5, Informative) fact, can you mention any useful task the RIAA might have performed in the last four decades? Yes, of course, artists must sell their music. But they needn't do that through the RIAA, the same way that programmers needn't sell their programs through Microsoft. Artists that wish to rescue their dignity should try to emulate Linux and other Open Source programmers and find alternative ways to make a living from their art, instead of selling it for thirty gold pieces.
So John Doe was sharing over 600 mp3s.
Let's assume for the moment John Doe actually owns the CDs or tapes or records that these mp3s come from. This isn't so far fetched. Figure about 15 tracks per CD. That's 40 ripped CDs to get 600 mp3s. 40 CDs is not a large CD collection. And ripping 40 CDs, especially with today's faster drives, wouldn't take a 9-5 working person more than a week to accomplish.
So to legally have 600 mp3s on your machine is not far-fetched.
So assuming John Doe is in the clear in terms of ownership, how does just sharing the files make it illegal? For starters he could simply have a misconfigured p2p client. There's been a lot of discussion on various compsec boards about how this happens all the time and a person winds up sharing their entire hard drive's contents without knowing it. If this is the case with John Doe, should be be prosecuted? For having a misconfigured p2p client?
Let's say the p2p client is not misconfigured. John Doe has 600 mp3s out there for the sharing.
What legalities would be involved if John Doe were able to put up some sort of disclaimer before a user can connect to his machine. Something saying that "I legally own these mp3s. Only people who legally own the albums which contain these songs may download these files." Does that put John Doe in the clear now?
What about a simple "Authorized access only". I've been to a few security conferences and some sessions have talked about how offices should place even just those three simple words on the screen every time a user logs into a company machine. That way it becomes easier to prosecute crackers who get in. IANAL but from hearing several first-hand accounts something this simple does go a long way, legally. So couldn't it also be used to defend against someone illegally downloading mp3s off an open p2p share?
I don't know, just sharing mp3s doesn't seem like it should be a prosecutable offense.
Is this just a naive view?
If the host is controlled by the RIAA then; aren't the RIAA The pirates/ or isn't it then a authorized copy? What is the difference between downloading from RIAA and getting a CD from them?
Remember - Ifs and buts are like candy and nuts.
I think that the 'kiddy porn' argument is in the same vein as the 'Nazi' argument. eg. "That's something the Nazi's would do..." Ugh.
All this lost $$$ doesn't go to the artist anyway. Download the world.
Ummm ... I dunno ... I wonder how much stock they have in Capitol, BMG, Mercury and Reprise labels?
Likely as not, they are suing themselves with the outcome pre-ordained.
The only downside to this method is you can't properly grind or deep-fry the animal first. I can't think of anything tastier than a pig that's been ground up and shoved up its own ass to make sausage.
In other words, the currently predominating Colombian cartel is *very* valuable, right?
The phone company needs the customer's name and phone number to install or remove a DSLAM. How would you get around that?
This is slashdot, the morons have mod points and mod trolls like him do not do their homework or even think before moding.
This one is acting like tps12 who has a pattern of karma whoring when they have - karma and spends it all on really big trolling posts, and then repeats. A lot of slashdoters haven't caught on to this and proabably never will.
Only think you can do besides modding it down, ignoring them and adding them to your foes list, is to just laugh at those who fall for and continue to fall for it. Be glad you are not fooled that easily.
...how did the RIAA know that someone had downloaded 600 songs in a single day? Verizon would know this, but how would the RIAA?
Either way, this is scary stuff. I wonder if the RIAA knows how many songs I have on my external HD?
-----
There are two kinds of people in the world: those with loaded guns, and those who dig.
Avril Lavigne ??? ugly??? Is this your reference?
I hope not, the photo section is pretty good.
Hey! Avril Lavigne is attractive enough (for a teenager). She's also banal, punk-lite and overmarketed. To be fair, I too am sick of seeing her mug on every magazine, so I can sort of feel your pain...
Freedom: "I won't!"
If you ever get into trouble for having "pirated" mp3's on your system and you're being taken to court.... ...Most likely, your fine will be ridiculous and may even include jail time, the way these people are going after people (as unreasonable as that sounds...
SO...if you get into this bind and are actually GOING TO COURT for it, take an inventory of the songs that you are being held accountable for, and buy the albums. I GUARANTEE that this will cost less than your fines/legal fees/etc...and once you buy the cds, you'll be in the clear for having the mp3s.
NOW, I've thought about the few misc. companies that you're heard of that got busted by the RIAA for having servers dedicated to serving mp3s inside the company walls, and that they were fined more than 1 million dollars etc etc...
Why didn't any of their legal teams go on a SUPER shopping spree and go and purchase those albums?
Here's some math - assume you're sharing A LOT of mp3s, I mean TONS. What would that number be? Probably someone that has a LOT of mp3s would probably dedicate a hard drive to it, say, 120gb, right?
120GB = approx 117,000 MB.
1 mp3 on average = 5mb
117,000 mb / 5mb = 23,400 mp3s.
1 album on average = 8 songs
23,400 / 8 = 2925 albums you need to buy to be legal
average cost of an album = ~15.00
Total cost out of pocket to get out of trouble = A little more than $43k.
Not too shabby, and much better than the alternative (million dollar fines and jail time).
THINK people...would this work? I'd love to read your $.02.
From reading a similar article on CNET, I think CNN is mistaken in saying the person DOWNLOADED 600 songs in one day. I think it's more likely he UPLOADED 600 songs to various other people in one day, which is why the RIAA is interested in him.
Vote for Pedro
When the cops do a car theft sting and make it easy for someone to steal a car, isn't that authorized borrowing, since the cops are deliberately leaving it out for your to borrow?
I think the answer is "no".
If the RIAA really thinks that P2P is about stealing music, I strongly encourage them to gather a ton of evidence, and sue people in civil court. I have no problem with them going after people with their own resources, so long as they don't try to get law enforcement involved -- it should be the RIAAs problem to fix with their own money.
I'd think that after a while they'd realize that the money they spend going after customers would be better spent creating new customers instead.
Let me summarize all the posts for you:
*** RIAA Bad/Evil/Hitler/Dumb 89%
*** This is the End of the World 10%
*** Personal insults to Hillary Rosen 1%
Vote. Vote for those who will protect your constitutional rights, your freedom from government AND corporate intrusion and your right to due process regardless of the circumstance. -M
Normally to obtain this kind of information you have to ask a judge to make the other party give it to you. Here, the DMCA can be used to make the process nice and cheap. It will be like the DMCA takedown notices. They will be half-assed and wrong a large amount of time -- but the RIAA won't have to suffer for it.
If the account is in your name, you're on the hot seat.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
But who would trust a troll anyway?
Tax brackets do benefit the elite, by making it harder to become rich if you're not already. Income tax is just that: if you're just sitting on a big pile of assets, as opposed to bringing in more money, you're not incurring taxes.
...when you're writing a game...tweak the difficulty of "Easy" to something [your mother] can cope with. -- onion2k
I have noticed that most of the new P2P development is happening in Europe.
Could it be because they are gaining experience from unrestricted file sharing?
Networks, embedded in other networks are one of strongest new trends around and the U.S. is getting left behind. I blame the DMCA.
Robb,
Look -- I hate the RIAA and MPAA as much as anyone. I think they leave trails of slime wherever they go. But grow up: losers though they may be, if someone is illegally distributing copyrighted works, guess what? It's (*gasp*) illegal. This gives you the right to make them stop.
Does this mean I agree with the recent Supreme Court ruling re: the damn Sonny (couldn't he have hit that tree just a -little- bit earlier) Bono Act? Hell, no. But legitimate copyright is legitimate. Just because the corporation enforcing it is scum doesn't, alas, change that salient fact.
I don't for a moment think that P2P is "bad" because it can be used to share copyrighted files, no more than I think my spiffy butcher knife is "bad" because I could use it to kill someone. That doesn't mean that the -illegal- distribution of legitimately copyrighted materials, no matter how pervasive, is suddenly morally defensible.
Do I wish that, when I bought an album, the money went to the artist, and not the RIAA? Damn straight. But, until such time as record labels die off or learn right, it's the only legal, moral way to obtain your music. (NOTE: I have no qualms about downloading music for CDs I've lost, or vinyl I never upgraded -- I paid once, I see no need to pay again.)
Did you see the note about the Eldred case?
... is not
With copyright legislation such as the DMCA,
"[t]he wisdom of Congress' action
within [the Court's] province to second guess."
Eldred v. Ashcroft, slip op. at 32.
Crap!
Although I am opposed to adding more charges to my phone bill, I almost wouldn't mind if verizon added an extra 10 cents to my phone bill to defend against RIAA attacks.
"I bow to no man" - Riddick
Verizon wasn't making any sort of principled stand to protect its users' privacy, it just wanted to avoid the costs of complying with the (many) subpoenas it will now receive.
Maybe not. When companies recieve subpoenas, they often recieve some reimbursement for copying charges and the like.
My thought for the reason that Verizon was against this is because, as much as they don't want to admit it, P2P music sharing is broadband's killer app. Sure, they can brag that you can load pages faster, not have a second phone line, and that you can watch streaming video, but the main reason many people get broadband is p2p music piracy. If the RIAA makes it hard for people to use p2p, or makes broadband providers block p2p, Verizon will have fewer customers, and hence smaller PROFITS! It's one of those cases where what's good for the company is also good for the customer
I have blog like everyone else
Not anymore. Maybe you don't understand the full impact of this decision, because the judge sure did - a common carrier was just successfully subpoenaed and will be in trouble if they do not, or cannot, comply with a court order regarding the identity of the sender (or receiver).
You can now send a DMCA takedown notice to ANY internet peer within the jurisdiction of the United States of America and enforce it (possibly any peer anywhere if certain jurisdiction games are played).
Oh, wait! We haven't visited the RIAA's website this week! We'd better do it again, in case they think we've forgotten about them!
Note to self: issue vague DMCA takedowns to RIAA's hosts, and THEIR peers.
If they want to either destroy or control the internet for their own ends, and by this time it's clear that's basically the rather silly aim they're actually shooting for, they should feel the full wrath of an Internet Death Penalty.
I hereby encourage anyone who provides service for the RIAA to pull the plug, citing AUP violations. If it's co-located, fry the machine. Vilify hosting these people, and their contractors and subcontractors in the same way that hosting spammers are vilified.
And someone, for God's sake, come up with a GOOD peer-to-peer client that scrambles download locations - no, not Freenet, that's slow as holy fuck by design, but something that people can actually use. Gnunet looks hopeful.. then let's tell them where they can stick their revenues.
Fuck, even Robbie Williams 'gets it' now.
Robbie, if you're out there reading this (and frankly, I rather doubt it) - tell them where they can stick their record deal and go start your own label. You've got the talent, contacts and personality to pull quite a few good artists with you, and the more artists that leave the ranks of the 'old' record companies for more clueful ones, the weaker position the RIAA and IFPI et al will be in, having to find new shit wannabe bands to sucker into signing their souls over in exchange for their face on TV, several grand worth of debt and not a single cent of royalties. Sooner or later, they'll all 'get it', the RIAA labels' last CD will be the Sony Music president on a kazoo which sells 30 copies, all of which were bought by the Sony Music president, and then these fuckwits and their attack shark lawyers will have to crawl down the drains, back where they came from before the only creatures that make lawyers tremble - liquidation consultants - come running.
Fuck 'em. Fuck 'em all. Because hell, they're fucking the artists and us, they've been getting away with it for decades now and, frankly, they deserve kidnapping and locking in a totally black room with no food or water, thirsting to death to the sound of Richard Stallman singing The Free Software Song at 120 decibels. On repeat until their bones bleach. And you know what? I'll laugh at them the whole time, because they never learned that those who fight technology are doomed to be made redundant by it, and because they've been torturing MY ears for the last GODDAMN TWENTY YEARS with unlistenable "pop" crap engineered and promoted to sell, never to actually sound good or mean anything, and it's time for a little fucking PAYBACK!
Hilary Rosen's a bitch; she's a big fat bitch; she's the biggest bitch in the whole wide world.
..is a big fat fuckin' bi--itch!
She's a mean old bitch, if there ever was a bitch; she's a bitch to all the boys and girls...
On Monday she's a bitch; on Tuesday she's a bitch; on Wednesday through Saturday she's a bitch,
Then on Sunday, just to be different, she's a Super-King-Kamehameha Beeyatch!
Have you ever met RIAA Pres Hilary Rosen; she's the biggest bitch in the whole wide world.
She's a mean old bitch; she has stupid hair; She's a bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch.
Bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch, She's a stupid bitch! (Whoo!)
Hilary Rosen's a bitch, and she's such a dirty bitch.
I really mean it!
Hilary Rosen....
Yeeaaaaaahhhhh.
>> ...power's concentrated in the hands of the copyright holders...
Yep, by definition. That's what copyright is all about.
Trying to make a case that posting hundreds of copywritten files on the net for further copying by anyone constitutes fair use is hopeless. That's piracy. You do not have the right to share copywritten material, in its entirety, with, potentially, the rest of the globe. Copyright's primary purpose is to prevent that kind of wholesale copying. The only difference between p2p copying and commercial piracy is that p2p pirates don't charge (hence the "sharing" claim), while commercial pirates do charge.
Too bad some poor sod of a Verizon customer is caught up in this. They should be going after Kazaa and the rest, who wouldn't exist and wouldn't profit except for their ability to facilitate widespread piracy.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Since when is the burden of proof on the the defense? CA law and OR law, (I looked them up cause I was bored, when I used to have a contract with a government agency, and was waiting for sh*t to compile...)
Both explicitly define what the terms mean. ie, they define driver as being operator of motor vehicle at time of offense, etc etc.
If the picture don't match, you cannot be held liable, because the statute lists how/when you are liable. The constitution also says something about how you are served the thing, and US Mail is not one of the allowed methods, which is why they don't mail you a court summons, etc etc.
They can't make the owner say who was driving, because the "ticket" is between the state and the person listed on the ticket. Since its obvious as this stage its not the person in question, this case will get dropped, end of story. It's the prosecution who must figure out who actually committed the offense.
Anyways, that's my 2 cents. I heard a lot from clients when I worked at client sites. I even talked to several highway patrol guys who said usually, (in CA anyways), they didn't pursue guys like those mentioned above, cause 99% of the time, people just stuck in a check, and mailed it back in, no questions asked... (At least not for the ones he witnessed)
It may be tempting to see this issue in such stark terms but there are more angles to see it from. First, technology is making copying so easy that in order to enforce copyright as conceived of twenty years ago will basically force us to become a police state... even if one is in favor of copyrights, is that worth it? Second, the recording industry has done an exceedingly good job of making people in general think that they're not qualified to produce music and works of art that matter; this is an untruth which is a tremendous blight on our world right now, the notion that "artists signed with the recording industry" is the same as "people who are capable of creating something of value".
.
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
I am online, doing a whole bunch of things at one time over my DSL connection from Bell South. Maybe I'm Googling "Heart" and "Straight On", downloading an MP3 I found of that song and web chatting with an old dear friend about what we used to do when that song was playing on my stereo at my old apartment.
All the while I am doing this, the RIAA is listening in. Checking to see what I download and what sites I visit.
Is the RIAA not now guilty of what used to be called wiretapping? Namely, the interception of communications traveling over my phone lines?
What am I missing here? How can a private, non-governmental organization do this legally? Isn't this what would get me thrown in jail if I did it? Or am I wrong and can I sniff the traffic passing through my neighbor's Internet connection and then threaten to expose his transvestite fetish if he doesn't keep his dog quiet?
Just a simple question...
How come Slashdot never gets Slashdotted?
In this discussion, it is important to remember that there are two issues here that need to be separated before you start ranting and raving.
issue 1. the ability for a court to request that an internet service provider (or some other intermediate or secondary entity) provide identifying information about alleged infringers of copyright protected material [in this case, verizon are the secondary parties].
issue 2. an entity (the copyright holder, or party with rights in the copyright works) with information that identifies a copyright infringer making the request in (1) [in this case, RIAA].
You can disagree with that tactics of (2) [i.e. the overbearing strong-arms], but you can't disagree with the issue in (1) where the court decides that based upon information provided by (2), that there is prima facia case for copyright infringement, and there is sufficient information to be able to identify the infringing party.
The court has to exercise its judgement (and it doesn't always get it right, but typically it's not too gung-ho) to determine whether (2)'s evidence looks worthy.
The entity in (1) is technically responsible for secondary infringement when it comes to the copyright material - but under safe harbour provisions, it is indemnified until it is made aware of infringement, and takes actions to deal with infringement. This safe harbour concept existed wrt. copyright and intellectual property before DMCA and its explicit safe harbour provisions existed.
If (1) is made aware that it is party to secondary infringement, and faced with strong evidence that this is the case, and (1) takes no action, then potentially, (1) becomes liable as a party to the infringement as it would then have "sufficient" knowledge that infrigement is taking place, yet chose not to deal with it.
I'm sorry if you think that freedom of speech allows (1) to turn a blind eye to infringement of copyright, but if you do think this, you just don't understand how things work properly. (1) has some protection against things that it is not aware of, but it doesn't have absolute protection, that would just render it impossible to enforce many laws where there is evidence of an illegal act taking place, but a secondary party needs to provide information to help narrow down the entity.
No, this is:
1. An attempt, and order by the COURTS to uphold the LAW as written by the CONGRESS that you elected.
2. It is an act by the government to uphold the Constitution which sets up the 3 independent branches of government.
it's
(if (falling sky)
(panic)
)
What if the next version of gnutella/kazaa/whatever simply encrypts the IP address of the requester/server. Would it not require a reverse-engineering of the software to determine the method used to encrypt the IP address, thus not allowing the (RI|MP)AA to give the ISP a list of IP addresses?
Sure, this is just a variation on the old Pig Latin plugin, but why would it not be valid?
that any good? I like the title.
Aren't they fighting a losing battle?
alt.binaries.sounds.*.mp3. .
I mean really people, it seems kind of obvious--I never get my music from the friggin' web for precisely this reason. Though I suppose the RIAA/Gestapo could next somehow get all the binary groups removed. Perhaps. Oh well, off to P2P. .
Peer to peer networks need security. They need encryption, access control.
Both http and it's cousin gnutella do GET "name of song.mp3". How much easier could you have it to scan for song exhanges? Good encryption gets rid of that.
Access control might be based on volume. The more songs you trade and somehow you could link a key exchange to it. There would be a limit and the system should be designed to divide people into cells. That way, if one section of the network is compromised, the rest can continue exchanging documents.
This is my sig.
The RIAA produces the best music in the world like Nsync, Britney Spears, and uh, uh well my mind is blank right now on any new bands. But anyway since the bands listed above are such high caliber and will be remembered for centuries to come like Mozart and The beatles I am sure piracy has to be the real reason.
After all the RIAA is such a popular group of friendly, ethical, and hard working folks that consumers just love to buy from. They would have no incentive to boycut anyway. After all nobody even used napster back in 99 when they made record profits. Morpheous is so much more popular today and I am the big retailers are also hurting do to piracy. What they made money??? Well, uh I am sure its really still piracy. The economy is so strong right now and music is priced so low that it should just be flying off the shelves.
Poor RIAA they are the true ethical and honest victims of piracy.
http://saveie6.com/
A lot of the P2P clients automatically scan your HD for songs and/or movies. It's possible that this guy could have installed a client and had been sharing all his files by accident.
Now, whether or not that's the case......that's for the courts to decide (or I guess by default the RIAA since they seem to control the courts these days).
"For a successful technology, honesty must take precedence over public relations for nature cannot be fooled." -Feynman
Good or bad, perhaps the industry will eventually see a service in it's infancy.
I remember the 'old' economy where tech companies were the underdogs and couldn't be taken seriously. My how things have changed.
The culprit released a statement to the associated press today which read "I freely admit to having downloaded influences for my work in the past. However, I should not be held responsible for the 600 mp3 downloads in question, as they were 600 copies of the Bob Dole Viagara commercial, spammed to my email address which had been farmed from the spyware version of Kazaa. Sincerely, P. Diddy."
I applaude the ruling it was a just and sound decision that will stand up to scrutiny. The court must provide remedies for copyright holders. But there just might be a silver linning to this. The judge just handed the RIAA the gun to shoot themselves in the foot with whether he knew or not. The RIAA will have a very tough case to win against this soon to be not so anonymous user. Even if they do win it will be costly both monetarily and to the reputation of the industry. Let them prosecute the users of P2P's that break the law. It will be a great mistake perhaps even a fatal one. The main issue I see with this is the ISP will spend tons of money complying with an aparent overwhelming number of subpenas that will be sent and many ISP's may go under or do worse things to peoples privacy online than comply with a judges order.
The truth suffers more from convictions than from lies.
"This guy downloaded over 600 songs in a day" We'll probably find out next week that the songs were "much faster than average", so it was really only 142 songs.
Last.fm - join the social music revolution
My theory is that the the way he was able to find 600 songs and download them so quickly is that the RIAA set up a honeypot. How else would they actually be able to track who's downloading what? Is there a way to track downloads of other people? Perhaps they're packet sniffing Verizons incoming and outgoing data, but I expect that the RIAA just set up an uber-MP3 server and recorded what came their way.
If that's true, that begs the question: Is this a form of entrapment? And is the RIAA guilty of copyright infringement because they set up an uber-server?
if the RIAA would quit wasting so much money trying to find pirates, the price of their cds would go down. if that happened, i would buy more cds, and stop being a pirate.
If they would block known services on residental accounts, spammers would find it harder and more expensive to do their work.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
According to the Court Decision [pdf], the complaint alleged that "John Doe" downloaded 600 songs over the KaZaA network in one day.
If you want to have business level service, run your own business. Or pony up the money for a business cable connection. I have a business cable connection for $60 USD a month. Residental users shouldn't need to run their own SMTP, since the ISP is responsible for the mail services, etc.
You may say it's wrong, and that's your opinion. So change ISPs, but know that the ISP you go to because it's easy for you to host mail, is also an ISP spammers will go to. And that means they'll likely be RBLed anyway.
I don't think blocking out a few people who want business-quality service at residential-rates is much of a price to pay to stop spammers.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Let them know? "Excuse me sir, this is a courtesy call from the RIAA. Did you know what you did was illegal? Just thought you'd like to know!"
More likely they're going to take said person into a dark alley and beat him/her with a shovel.
ISP sues you for making a material misrepresentation in your request for a subpeona.
Or maybe the spammer does.
You can't use this particular provision of the DMCA unless you are using it in good faith, and will use that information explicitly to protect a copyright. Using for any other reason just opens you up to a whole world of hurt.
Of course, you read the statute and the ruling from the court so you'd know that, didn't you?
paintball
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
GeneralEmergency
You have to state that 1) You are issuing the subpeona in good faith and 2) That you will not use the information for any other purpose
And if you violate 1 or 2, then the other party has civil recourse. Laws don't stop people from doing bad things, they provide penalties for people doing bad things. It's the same here - use the DMCA in a bad way, you can be penalized for it.
paintball
i run kazaa on verizon...
;-P
and i keep all my mp3s on an external usb drive... not because i'm a paranoid schizophrenic.... just because it's big
could someone tell me what is preventing me from unplugging the thing and taking it to work and putting it in my desk drawer/ mailing it to my sister/ putting it in storage/ dropping it in the east river/ etc?
would the logs be enough for them to act?
or would they need a "smoking gun"/ "whirring hard drive" to make their case against me?
is an ip log enough grounds to prosecute?
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
MMmmmmm....pap.
The RIAA can subpoena an ISP? I thought this had to be done through a law enforcement agency? The RIAA can act as the Internet cops now?
I try to be very polite when posting, but you're really very arrogant and you make many unwarranted assumptions.
I have a static address. And I have a SLA that states flat out that I can do anything that I want to with my line (that's not spam, attacks, or other forms of abuse). I can put any server I want to on that line. That's my relationship with my ISP and it's been that way for more than five years.
You claim to allow me to have my own opinion, and you claim to think that that is fine. But in reality, you don't want to allow me to have my opinion, and you want to interfere with the private relationship I have with my ISP. You want me to change ISPs. You think that only if I pay more am I really a legitimate user. And you don't even know how much I do pay. In reality, you do not think it is fine for people to have their own opinion or for them to be able to act on them. You want to regulate other folks activities even when you have no evidence that that regulation would positively affect you or others one way or another. Please stop claiming that you think it is all right for others to have their own opinions. You really do not.
Just because you have a $60 / month business line has no relevance as to whether others can obtain the same service at the same price, or whether that price is a cost that other legitimate users can or need to be able to pay.
Just because you believe one ISP's claim that they serve business class DSL users different from residential class DSL users, is no reason to think that in general any other ISP, or my ISP actually does treat business class DSL users differently than residential class DSL users.
Again, stop advocating the breaking of the internet.
Talk about class warfare!
Of course, he only really downloaded 60 songs, but since he had a DSL connection, the RIAA counted it as 600.
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
If anyone truly wants the music industry to eat noise, then stop talking and start DOING. What I mean is STOP SUPPORTING THEM...just don't buy the music. We either stop supporting this greedy, monopolistic regime, or we continue to deal with the increasingly invasive and strong-armed tactics. There is no middle ground. This is one case where people can clearly NOT have their cake and eat it too.
Can I also send a letter of demand to my ISP and get every record of everything I have done on the internet (excluding my stupid comments on /.).
Can I then demand that that information be removed from all systems they own? I feel a lawsuit coming on to test this damned DMCA.
Forgive me for hijacking a post at the top of the thread.
The short summary is this: The DMCA allows KaZaa to exist. No DMCA, no KaZaa.
The part of the DMCA that deals with getting user identities is there BECAUSE IT MAKES SENSE. I know slashdotters don't WANT to believe this, but it's still true.
Prior to the DMCA, any ISP that transmitted or had on its servers copyrighted material could concievably be held liable for violating the copyright of the material. The DMCA changed that: ISP's are now *NOT* liable for having or trasmitting copywritten material, IF:
When told that someone else is using the ISP to store or transmit copywritten material, the ISP provides the identity of that user and removes/blocks access to the copywritten material.
PROVIDED:
The person making the request owns the copyright or represents someone who does, BELIEVES the copyright is being infringed, and will ONLY use the information gained to protect the copyright
OR ELSE:
The ISP can sue their pants off.
So, if you illegally copy copywritten material, you're screwed.
If not, your ISP can tell the person issuing the subpeona to screw off, and sue them for it to boot. Or you can sue them. And your state's attorney can prosecute them for perjury.
The DMCA is designed specifically to hold people committing illegal acts resopnsible for those acts while protecting the ISP's used in the process, and it does exactly that. The only way your identity is going to be revealed to ANYONE is if 1) You're doing something illegal or 2) Someone committed perjury to get your identity and then you, your ISP, and your DA can bring civil and/or criminal charges.
If the DMCA were not there, KaZaa wouldn't exist because every ISP would be scared silly about being sued for copyright infringement and would have blocked KaZaa and anything like it a long time ago.
paintball
consider how far this may go. 600 songs sounds like a lot over one day, but what if they stretch it to include 600 songs in a year? Where will the line be drawn for fair use?
Yes, some people are downloading songs and never buying the album, but many are. Assuming everyone to be guilty first, and then laying the onus on them to prove otherwise is not historically how these things have been or should be approached.
Many people have legitimate reasons for downloading mp3's and sharing them. It could be their own created songs, a favorite song sent to a friend to cheer them up, a mix playlist for a friend, or how about having your own (legally owned) playlist available online at all times no matter where you are?
Noone will convince me that mp3 sharing wont lead to increased sales for an artist, if they are talented. You hear an artist you like and you realize you must support this band. People who never buy the album after downloading the mp3s, would probably have never bought it anyway.
Here is what I think the record labels are really fighting:
They invest certain amounts of money into advertising the "one hit wonders" and they expect to get a serious return on this investment. Mp3 sharing hurts this business practice, as word of mouth and free adverstising is available through other means than the ones they control, pesky peer-to-peer. Heard anything new and independant on the radio lately? Meaning something not heavily invested in by a record label. I'll say No.
The "controlled" music market is what they want. It's like insider trading, a perfect way to invest in a product and get it sold without worry of competition cutting into their profits. If people are downloading mp3 of older bands or unsigned bands, and then going out and buying those albums, well this cuts into the sales of the "new thing" they are currently pushing everyone to buy.
Yes mp3s are hurting their business, but not the way they want you to think.
Perhaps Verizon could copyright the DHCP logs, add some lame encryption (CSS?) and then offer each log file as a "product". The price, of course, would be rather steep ($1,000,000 each). Such a copyrighted work would naturally be protected by DMCA, right?
Of course, RIAA wants just one line, but they would have to buy the entire overpriced "album". If Verizon is forced to hand over their digital "log file product" because of a DMCA subpeona, then they make up a stupid song and then subpeona the entire RIAA catalog, so they can search for "infringing" uses of their song lyrics.
John Bates is the same judge who declared that Vice pres Cheney has the right to privacy concerning his secret meetings regarding the formulation of the energy 'policy' (while on government property).
He was also on Ken Stars team leaking grand jury testimony to the press.
He was appointed in 2001 by bush2.
So what's the chance that the ID of the 600+ file-sharer turns out to be a P2P "Garbage" Spreader hired by the RIAA?
MjM
I only mod up...
XKCD:Xeric Knowledge Comically Dispen
thanks for ripping of Phil Hartman's Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer skit.
IMO they'd offer WMA or AAC, not vorbis, mpc, or mp3. An even better option would be losless but I guess the filesizes would be too large for most people to download. The reason I don't think they'd support mp3, mpc, or vorbis is because they don't have DRM and are too open. As far as losless WMA would be the only other bet because FLAC and Monkeys Audio are open.
Pass the Vasiline and bend over.
How much justice can you afford?
I lost a cell phone and tried to track it down using the SIM# but Verizon told me there was nothing I could do even a subpoena was no garantee that they could give me any information about anyone using that SIM#. Essentially I'd be wasting my time.
Now I can go back with a subpoena in hand to nab the thief.
If you don't like the RIAA/MPAA just click, and minimize the window...
After all these RIAA, DMCA, music sharing Slashdot stories in the last couple of weeks I got an idea. First: Why not ask a couple of bands to donate a song or two (no copyright) for a CD that would be released only online. You could download each song separately for $1 as a wav that you could burn on a music CD or you could download it as an mp3 for $0.40. This is I guess the ideal way that the Slashdot crowd would want (maybe we slightly different prices?). The money from sales would pay for the hosting and bandwidth and the rest would go directly to the artists. Second: Track the spread of theses songs (they would have to be previously unreleased) on the p2p networks and see if this kind of publishing pays of for the artist. This is the nontrivial (if not impossible) part of this idea (to acurately estimate the total number of downloads on p2p networks, as compared to the number of payed downloads from the official site). This would be a proof of concept for artists to see whether it is economically reasonable to publish their work online.
I will start sending out subpoenas to my ISP regarding the identity of the senders of Porn spam and charge them (senders) with providing porn to minors. At our house the computer is often used by minors and all the filters in the world dont stop the crap. (nothing wrong in my eyes with naked girls but animals, machines, and kids etc are way out in left field.)
Verizon by law is allowed to bill the RIAA for the production of records. If it is a civil Subpoena Verizon can bill .15 cents a page and $10.00 an hour. Federal Grand Jury Subpoena I believe is .10 cents a page and $11.00 an hour. Often times those rates do not cover for the entire cost of retrieving, assembling, and delivery of those records. It is an expense that can over time become costly, but likewise it is a necessary evil, by law they are required to produce those records no matter how much money they lose, else they will be in contempt.
I hate all sigs, even this one.
Just read this on CNN:
Famous singer Robbie Williams says: Music piracy 'great'
Perhaps I'm just a little naive to this type of discussion, but if the RIAA has grounds to suspect that the user of the IP address downloaded 600+ songs in a day from a P2P, doesn't that indirectly implicate the RIAA in uploading 600+ songs to that user's IP? If so, does the RIAA have the legal authority to upload copyrighted works (are the copyrights assigned to RIAA in the first place?) Another hypothetical: Listening to a Shoutcast streaming radio station, you decide to capture the incoming stream and archive to hard drive. At 4 min / song, you would capture 360 songs in one day. How is this materially different from downloading the same material from a P2P source or taping from broadcast radio?
Yes, the RIAA - rather than putting their money and muscle towards making music downloadable and cheap - would rather keep trying to shut d/ling down.
In their mind set, they've had this monopoly and now revenue is down so they blame it on 'theft' instead of shitty music that's badly overpriced. Another reason their revenue is down is the animosity that the RIAA breeds against its very customers. (I am much more likely to buy a CD from someone who has stood up to them then a band that throws its support behind them. I try and take note of bands that support the RIAA in this endeavor and not buy their shit. [*cough* Metallica*cough*])
What they need to do is realize that if they weren't raping everyone, this would be a non-issue. Actually, I'm going to take that back and say the artists need to realize this.
If CDs weren't marked up 1000% or so, their biz wouldn't be hurting. I d/l songs and if I really like what I hear I will actually go buy the CD. When it's on sale. If there was a place where I was guaranteed to get quality at a cheap price AND it was easier to use than Kazaa I would be all over it.
I doubt I'm the only one.
Is that I've been dying to know who this guy was, and how many MP3s he supposedly had. Was he just some random schmoe chosen at random? Did he had an uber-eleet, terabyte collection of MP3s?
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
Hmm... Actually, the ewoks are from Endor. Chewbacca is from Kashyyk. But whose counting, right? ^_^
"PC Load Letter? What the $@#% does that mean?!"
Boycotting will work if it is done correctly.. Suppose everyone boycotts buying CDs, and doesn't use Kazaa/etc.? There are some 3 million users right now on Kazaa.. Lets say there were only 10,000 users, if CD sales STILL declined then the RIAA couldn't say with any authority that p2p is causing the loss of sales. Boycotting involves sacrificing something to make a point, not obtaining illegally...
Since you can bait people with 'fake' servers, and track who downloads what, how long before they start having downloaders arressed in masse?
Or just mandate content id for ISP's and make them rat on their own customers..
And of course the BSA and MPAA are standing in line, drooling..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Is this ethical?
Is this legal?
Will the RIAA still try to screw me?
Does anyone know if this decision is going to be appealed? Is this going to stick or is Verizon going to fight it?
Also, what keeps me from alleging privacy violations against someone else just to get their info? Is their any standard at all for "probable cause" now that the no longer need an actual subpoena?
Life is too short to proofread.
maybe they saw his list of shared files through some p2p network and grabbed his address. but then they have no basis for guessing at how many he downloaded in one day, or if he downloaded any of them at all.
maybe they watched him leech the files all in one day from a p2p node that they either own or control. then they have basis for the accusation, but wouldn't a reasonable person argue that if the RIAA put the files up themselves, or caused them to be put up, on a p2p network, that they enouraged, aided, abetted the infraction they're now investigating? isn't that entrapment??
If I leave the house and my kids or the babysitter installs Kazza on my machine, am I liable? If I get a c&d letter, and my kids reinstall the program, am I going to jail? Can minors be prosecuted for breaking a copyright contract? I know, lock down the computer so they can not gain access to the internet...or just stand over their shoulder the whole time they are on the web...or just stop subscribing to an isp. Wasn't the internet designed to share ideas and knowledge? I don't agree with breaking the law, but two wrongs don't make a legal decision.
Not quite. For example, I have financial records going back more than the seven years required by the IRS. I currently am not under investigation by the IRS. I shred all records older than seven years.
Is that obstruction of justice? No.
Now, let us suppose that I know that I will be getting a visit from the IRS tomorrow, and I suspect that they will want all my records. I shred them. That is dangerously close to obstruction of justice - the procecution could make the case that I knew what was coming and shredded them simply to avoid giving them to the IRS. And of course, were I served formal notice that the IRS was going to investigate me, then any shredding would definitely be obstruction of justice.
Notice how I put the situation - you encrypt the logs for security. Should you need access, you send them off.
Now, you get served. You co-operate fully - you turn over the logs, you give them the name of the party in East Elbonia, you give them his contact data. You are co-operating fully with them.
Your friend in East Elbonia may not be, but that is out of your control. YOU are not obstructing justice.
Yes, it is a fine line. But that is one of the reasons to have a lawyer.
www.eFax.com are spammers
I AM ABOVE THEE LAW!!!
Those lines were actually from South Park, not that minor fact like this would stop you from trying to impress us with your lack of knowledge.
...Im glad theres a pond called the Atlantic between me and the USA! That RIAA of yours is starting 2 overextend its reach,soon you will have to login on ur computers where a central computer will log ur exact movements on it to see if your music (if you listen to music on it) is legall for you to posess. I hope the European flavour of the RIAA doesnt get so powerfull! I truely feel sorry you guys trapped in a so called democracy where the individual is powerless. Maquis196
Go ahead, you can be judged by a panel of your peers, that is if you can call them that.
If they didn't get out of jury duty they're not my peers.
Then when they rule against you, you will be fined out the ass, or if it's criminal be bubba's bitch.
People accept pleas for a reason, they are a sure thing, with a jury God only knows your fate.
The court system won't run out of money, it will just take longer to get your case through the system. Then when the budget for next year comes around they will get more money to push the cases through a bit faster.
Face it, if you pirate music, or rather, enable the piracy of anything there are consequences, if you don't like the consequences don't do it!
I just logged on to Kazaa at 10:50 pm. There were only 16 users on. This ruling has brought p2p to a dribble.
When are people going to wake up and realize that
1. The RIAA is not a Law Enforcement Agency
2. The RIAA is not even a government agency
3. Giving the RIAA a blanket subpoena power over all users on the internet gives everyone blanket subpoena power over all users on the internet.
4. The RIAA should not have ANY Subpoena power, they're not a court, they're not a grand jury, they're just a business.
5. The RIAA should contact the FBI if they have info on criminal activity.
You're an idiot. I get tons of spam. I DON'T CARE. Mail.app filters it all out flawlessly. There is no reason for anyone to restrict any of my ports for any reason. Spam will be there no matter WHAT. I don't know why people in this country want to pass laws and regulations and rules to try and fix EVERYTHING. It just doesn't work, and simply makes it a hassle for legit users to send mail with their personal domain. if i'm joe smith, i shouldn't have to pay anyone to send mail from joe@smith.com You are lame.
There are no "ranks" of the wealthy. At least not by your definition.
Fact is most americans are fucking rich as hell. People who complain about income tax keeping them down are such fucking whiners. "ohhh that big bad millionare only pays $80,000 a year, and here I am having to pay $20,000!"
Fact is, you don't have to pay that $20,000. You can tie up your funds too, it's just a question of knowing the tax law and a willingness to "invest" your money.
People are so ready to bitch about somone else having more. Seriously though, look at what you do have... we're all in the top 10% bracket in wealthiness in the world.
Face it, we're the rich bastards that make the laws. We're the ones that opress others with our so called "FreeMarket".
Sometimes we opress ourselves, but face it, we're the bad guys.
If the RIAA is really planning on shutting down all the peer to peer stuff on the internet then they need to provide a resonable alternative. An online service for say 20 a month for so many downloads. How hard is that. They always want to offer it for $20 a song or some outrageous figure. And then they put up crap like Billy Bob's greatest hits that no one in their right mind would download.
The RIAA should be going after the individuals doing the downloading. The RIAA shouldn't be able to get anything out of the ISP's - that should the job of the police and courts. ISP's should be treated like common carriers.
Anarchists never rule
Not quite. If it is the *specific* album that you purchased (meaning the physical object), then you as the owner may download mp3s made from it.
However, if someone with the same album, but a different physical copy, made the mp3s then you may not legally download them. Yes it is stupid but that's how it works in the U.S. at the moment.
This came into play when mp3.com tried to encode thousands of albums so that people who had already bought that album could listen to their music anywhere. Too bad mp3.com got bitch slapped by the RIAA.
Most cable ISPs will give out a new IP address
whenever the MAC or OID changes on the firewall/router. So why not just keep changing that and keep getting a new IP. Who's to know? Do they ID subscribers via the cable modem|dsl modem ? Anyway I am personally going to abstain from buying any music in any form until the music industry morons realize that file sharing is not the reason their industry is sucking right now. It sucks because there's so much crap and most people just aren't buying that much music anymore. Turn on the radio these days and you'll discover that talk radio shows are the big winners.
http://tinyurl.com/3t236
Let's say they do get someone's IP address, and let's say they find out who had that IP at the time ( as IP's change on some accounts )
If there are 3 computers in the house, and only one has songs on it, they are all legit, blah, blah, [insert infintite scenarios]...
Can your really sue someone simply based on an IP? Can't this be -
1) faked
2) Used by someone else
3) Be a simply a lie from RIAA (how could you proove this true or false??)
It's like, saying "Bob called Mary on the phone, and Mary sang this song, and she did it illegally." Even though it's illegal to tap anyone's phone line, so you couldn't have gotten this information legally, so if the RIAA is serving up songs to catch people, then they are promoting piracy themselves, arg the circles of logic here are giving me a head ache...
This is like Microsoft demanding you proved you paid for Windows or whatever, and threatening a fee if you can't proove it, it's just lunacy. As if they could force you to pay anyways...
So let's say the RIAA tracks you on the net, finds you downloaded a song, then reports you, how do they really proove you have done anything? And even if they say you downloaded a song, wouldn't they have to have proof you actually have the song?
-v
1. It's hard to get worked up over this. I think the RIAA
are gougers like virtually everyone else here. However,
many of the most vociferous critics are indeed committing piracy.
2. The RIAA sued Verizon. They might sue AOL, MSN, and others too.
But they probably won't bother with all the small-potatoes ISPs
because they barely know they exist. These are the same
folks who will produce tools and players for Mac to read their media but won't for linux even
though the OSs are both similar and support a similar
number of users.
It is not about stolen songs anymore. They can now subpoena anyone they suspect without a going to a judge. That means that if they even think you did it, they can get your personal information and then they can threaten you with legal action. It will now be up to you to prove you did not do it and you will always be on their lists. For some easy ways that an innocent person can get trapped say you download or share a file with a name like a popular song, say you download or share a recording of a live concert which is legal, or say you run a file sharing service with nothing really illegal but because you are running a file sharing service it may be enough to meet the lowest criteria of suspicion. They will now be able to know virtually everything your ISP knows about you like your name, address, phone number, and your IP. Even if they never use it against you, they can now put your data into their database and do with what they will. Think complete tracking if you have a static IP or even a dynamic IP, if they choose to make real-time demands on an ISP. They could literally watch you on-line. We will also have to pay the cost to the ISPs. I am so tired of those who can not see that it is not about the songs and whether its theft or not anymore, it is about basic human rights. These monsters need to be stopped. In the US when a person commits a heinous crime against humanity they often lose their civil rights. Why not an industry? I think, they no longer deserve even the privileges they had before this all began. They are abusing the people of our country and they need to be stopped.
Make a $25.00 donation to the EFF www.eff.org and then send an email to the RIAA telling them that instead of buying one or two CD's this month, you spent your CD money on something which was worth the cost.
STOP BUYING CD's
Listen to your old shit or trade with friends. Next year I want to hear the RIAA bitch that sales are down %50 You know they will still blame pirates but once Kazaa and Gnutella are shutdown they won't have any places to point their fingers.
It really pains me that so many people think that just because something is in digital form, that it's free.
I am a programmer. Some programs I write are sold for money and are proprietary. Some others are Free Software (free as in freedom) which I give away. Why? Because I choose to license them as such.
The VERY SIMPLE point that some people don't seem to get is that UNLESS THE AUTHOR GIVES YOU THE FREEDOM TO COPY HIS/HER WORK *YOU* *CAN'T* *DO* *IT*.
Take it in and stop whining about "your rights" when all you have been doing by downloading 600 MP3s a day is infringing on the rights of the VERY ARTISTS YOU LOVE.
Yes, the RIAA has lots of money and YES it's easy to see them as the bad guy. But that's just a COP OUT!!
It boils down to: YOU DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO DOWNLOAD MP3s FOR MUSIC YOU DON'T OWN. FULL STOP.
So, please spare us all the whining and the crying and the "I wonder why they're doing this to poor old us" routine.
GJC
Gregory Casamento
## Chief Maintainer for GNUstep
First, you need to realize that there is a definite split between criminal and civil law. The RIAA CANNOT bring criminal charges against you. The RIAA cannot put you in jail, prison or on probation. Only a government law enforcement agency can bring criminal charges against you. However, any group or individual can bring suit against any other group or individual.
Second, the RIAA subpoenaing records from Verizon was perfectly legal, proper and just. Whatever their motive, they have a right to do so, just as each and every one of us have a right to subpoena. It is reviewed by a court, and decisions can be appealed if you don't agree with them.
Third, since the RIAA can only pursue a civil case against this individual, they can only ask for a few remedies, such as money, an injunction to stop, and a few other things depending on the jurisdiction (state, federal, etc.) the suit is brought in. In all liklihood, the RIAA will NOT be able to recover their attorney fees and other litigation-related costs.
Fourth, there is an incredible amount of cost involved in bringing a suit. The RIAA can expect to spend upwards of $100,000 to bring suit against each person they want to sue. This means that they will probably not be able to afford to sue every person out there. They are most likely doing this to intimidate people into stopping. They know very well how expensive litigation is.
Fifth, if, in the unlikely fact that the RIAA does sue you, the amount they will be able to recover is pretty small. Though it depends on the jurisdiction, again, they most likely will NOT be able to sue for their costs, attorney fees, etc. They will probably only be able to sue for their actual damages. Again, this depends on several factors, but it would apply to most cases.
Sixth, though you can always hire an attorney to defend yourself, it is legal EVERYWHERE to appear pro se (or pro per in some states) to defend yourself. Though the law is complex and difficult, there are enough resources out there to learn a lot. Nolo Law is particularly good. Use what you learn to make discovery requests on the RIAA for whatever information you need to defend yourself. Most jurisdictions will also allow you to request a jury trial, too. Go in there, have your say, and see what happens. If you don't like the decision, you can always appeal it. Also remember that any such case will get a lot of media attention, and the RIAA might not be too keen to go into a jury trial with a pro se litigant. When you're dealing with another attorney, you usually have a pretty good idea what the other side will do. However, when dealing with a pro se litigant, ANYTHING can happen (and frequently does, I know). This is a scary reality for any group that has a PR department, especially when the cameras are rolling. So don't be intimidated; go in and argue your heart out.
Remember, they can't sue everyone. I can't advise anyone to do anything illegal, so don't, but at least you now know more about how the system works. Don't flame me for defending the RIAA's right to subpoena or telling you not to engage in illegal activity; believe me, the right to subpoena is a very powerful one you wouldn't want to lose and the laws are there for a reason. If you have a problem with the law, pressure your local, state and federal politicans. In many states you have the right to start ballot initiatives and other similar processes so USE THEM. If you don't, who will? I hope this was helpful.
Eliminating the dividend tax is not a break for the rich, it's a break for everyone who owns stock.
Currently dividends are taxed twice, once when the corporation gives them and again when you receive them. Because of this, it's an inefficient way to distribute money to shareholders.
Take Oracle, for instance. They have tons of cash and not enough growth opportunities to pursue to use it all. The best use of that money, from a shareholder's perspective, is to give it back to the investors, because the investors can find other uses for it that Oracle, as a giant company, can't (for instance, you might want to invest in a small sweater store down the street... that might be a great investment, but Oracle doesn't want to make it).
The double tax promotes corporate cash-hoarding and even mindless speculation in risky ventures. It's a hold-over from the Depression, when they wanted to encourage companies to hoard cash and retain a cushion against hard times.
The majority of households in the US own stocks of one kind or another. Allowing them to make money on those stocks isn't a tax break for the rich at all.
Are you suggesting that the next RIAA attempt to poison the p2p networks will be to put kiddie porn onto them? The folks who gave us Britany Spears is above that, right? Hmmm, the sky really is falling now.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
It's not so much you and I having a right to be anonymous as it is others NOT having a right to force us to identify ourselves. You lose your rights when you abuse others, but until then you can tell others to fuck off and no one should be able to do anything about it. It's the fourth amendment, real evidence of wrong doing, sworn in a court of law, definate and prescribed search. Everything else is so much bullshit. As the internet is built on networks that run on public land, I'd say it's a public place and you don't have to cary ID in any public place.
This general principle applies to much more than fair use of music. It applies to your personal papers and effects, electronic or otherwise, and all that is your person and property.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
If I never buy CDs, and I copy music from my friend who does buy CDs, what has the RIAA lost? Nothing. So how is it stealing?
Because then you can enjoy this "product" without paying the cost. You did NOT purchase the title to "own" or "possess" such product. The product belongs to RIAA, sad to say.
I agree with EVERYTHING else you said. I disagree with RIAA as much as the next guy. RIAA's power is extended beyond limits. This is unacceptable. it gives a msg to the world that those who trends society will dominate those who follow the trend (like 90% of the world), in ALL AND UNLIMITED aspects, law, finance. However, retarded as it maybe, RIAA is the legal owner of the products: glorified songs by artists.
You cannot legal own a product without paying for it, or have some sort of special agreement. It does feel strange that the idea is that RIAA owns the songs. The artists themselves should own the song. It becomes outragous when power is asserted over internet radio (WTF? These people make like 2 dollars profit and is ADVERTISING FOR THE ARTIST). The trend is that as consumer, that RIAA's power is so far out of suitable range that I feel it's only a matter of time before singing a song by Britney Spears while walking down the street constitutes a royalty charge. Paying for the cost is ok, such as buying a CD, buying a DVD, or listening to endless repetitive broadcasts on radio and TV, but paying for the effect, such as cafes playing songs, singing on a walk, is not. Their action feels like the way it is is those who has control over the trend (J-Lo is cool because????) will dominate those who follow the trend, with power above and beyond ALL
Why would a Wookiee -- an eight foot tall Wookiee -- want to live on Endor with a bunch of two foot tall Ewoks? That does not make sense!
But more importantly, you have to ask yourself: what does that have to do with this case? (calmly) Nothing. Ladies and gentlemen, it has nothing to do with this case! It does not make sense!
Freenet is free software designed to ensure true freedom of communication over the Internet. It's the only safe place to play. http://freenetproject.org/cgi-bin/twiki/view/Main/ WebHome
Karma: Bad due to google bombing - Robert Watkins woz 'ere.
It's time for cryptography.
.mp3 files should be stored crypted. Any P2P software should be able to crypt/decrypt on the fly. So files you share and files you downloaded are not verrifyable. Best you even store the filenames crypted. So that nobody can even guess, what is on your HD (and you do not use a crypted file system).
Communication between P2P nodes should be crypted (so nobody could that easily sniff between them). Sure, this doesn't help if a node belongs to RIAA, but they shouldn't offer music anyways, and in case they offer something else under a wrong name (for example a fake file under the name "Joe_Coker-Unchain_my_heart.mp3") than it should not be illegal to download this file anyways.
Then
Then mp3 players should be able to decrypt those files on the fly (you only once enter your password in the beginning when you start your mp3 player).
Mp3 encoder should be able to crypt their output on the fly (you only once enter the password when you start the encoder).
Weekest point: if the password is week or someone from RIAA hacks your computer and sniffes your password.
The whole thing should be bloddy easy to use and install etc.
<RANT>
Darn, I hate those RIAA people!
</RANT>
We all know that jaywalking is the gateway crime to mass murder and child molestation. The government told us so.
Cheers
-b
If I wanted a sig I would have filled in that stupid box.
...now those "your computer is broadcasting an IP address" banner ads make sense
According to the RIAA everyone with broadband is a pirate.
So are they just going to demand every broadband carrier in the country to give up their user lists, and send out the feds to everyones house one at a time?
Guess taht means the government can also demand the lists if you are saying the ' wrong things ' as well.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
The artists who see the dollar signs in their eyes need to wake up and smell the roses: get rid of the fat cat middlemen (record labels) and go independent on the web.
As a result of all this knee-jerk reaction on the part of the music industry, I am boycotting. I will not pay for high priced cruft, when I can get cruft for free from indy artists on the web.
Lodragan Draoidh
The more you explain it, the more I don't understand it. - Mark Twain
The hills are a live with paid off judges. Here's a little song i adapted
bye bye rights,
bye bye fair use act, Hello internet tax.
i think i'm gonna cry
bye bye inivation,bye bye fair pricing, hello DMCA
it's choking choking off competition
bye bye my rights goodbye
For posting that; the law in the US is indeed this bizarre and the more people that realize it, the better. (That is: it is illegal to download an mp3 of a song you own; not because it's morally wrong, but because the law in the US really is that insane)
How hard would it be to add an affirmative defense into the copyright laws to make it legal to download re-encoded versions of songs you already own, and to provide immunity for those who provide encoded versions of songs so long as they do due diligence to make sure the downloader has a legal copy of the song?
I seem to remember that there was some talk by a few representatives of introducing such a bill back when the whole mp3.com case was going on, but I haven't heard anything about that since then. (Since mp3.com has been absorbed into the music cartel and no one else seems willing to try their business model, I suppose I can understand why no one in power would care much these days)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A358 56-2003Jan9.html
2 002.ht ml
a le s30dec30004431,0,3580359.story?coll=la%2Dheadlines %2Dpolitics
w su it.ap/index.html
t m
Or consider the ruling of Judge John D. Bates in December declaring that Congress's General Accounting Office -- and thus the public -- had no right to learn the specifics about meetings between Vice President Cheney's famous energy task force and various energy executives and lobbyists. The same John Bates, an appointee of the current president, was an attorney for Ken Starr's Whitewater investigation and pushed hard (and successfully) for the release of various White House documents related to Hillary Rodham Clinton's activities.
here is his court's web:
http://www.dcd.uscourts.gov/district-court-
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-gonz
As White House counsel, Gonzales has moved to strengthen Bush's power as a wartime commander by saying, for example, that the president on his own authority can designate terrorism suspects as "enemy combatants" and lock them up without criminal charges, a trial or even access to a lawyer.
At the same time, he has moved to shield the White House from outside scrutiny. His office refused a request from the General Accounting Office to learn who met with Vice President Cheney when he was formulating the administration's energy plan.
The GAO went to court, but the administration won the first round when Judge John Bates, a new Bush appointee, threw out the lawsuit.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/LAW/12/30/abm.treaty.la
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit by 32 lawmakers who wanted to stop President Bush's withdrawal from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
The plaintiffs had contended the withdrawal, which took effect in June, was unconstitutional because President Bush had not sought Congress' approval.
U.S. District Judge John Bates ruled Monday that the lawmakers lacked standing to bring the case, and the withdrawal from the treaty was a political matter, not judicial.
http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/1202/121702h1.h
(regarding poindexter's total information awareness system)
Defense has denied EPIC?s request for information about the TIA system, saying that the Freedom of Information Act doesn?t apply to the organization. That law requires the government to release information to the news media. If granted, a restraining order would probably compel the Pentagon to expedite EPIC's access to the information, perhaps even requiring that the information be turned over immediately. However, the department could protest the ruling and seek to block access on different grounds, possibly arguing that releasing the information would jeopardize national security.
Furthermore, since a temporary restraining order usually expires after 10 days, it is often converted into a preliminary injunction. Unlike a restraining order, the injunction can be appealed. John Bates, U.S. district court judge for the District of Columbia, will ultimately decide all the legal matters, including whether EPIC qualifies as a news entity, but months could pass before he does so, and the release of any information would probably be stayed during that time.
Right out of George Orwell...
If privacy is outlawed, only outlaws will have privacy.
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA"), enacted October 28, 1998, requires that the Copyright Office conduct three studies and report its findings and recommendations to Congress. The Office has already submitted two of the required reports to Congress.
c a/
http://www.loc.gov/copyright/reports/studies/dm
Is this a little scary? Sure. Not so much for me, because I've always felt that, if I like certain music, I should pay for it. But I know there are a lot of people out there that were playing by the "anonymous and no consequences" rules. Now the rules have been changed and it's scary.
However, if there is any enforcement to be done here, it's nice to see that they're looking at the right place. Napster was absolutely brilliant and it was a fantastic service. The service itself did not violate the law... rather, it was a tool for MP3 file sharing, and the content was up to the users of the service. Clearly, many people violated the law (as stupid as some may believe the law to be) while using Napster, and Napster paid the ultimate price, as a result of being held responsible for their user's behavior, which they really shouldn't have been.
Next in the pipeline is the ISP. They also shouldn't be held responsible. It's just like anything else illegal on the internet. Nobody would be surprised if the government was demanding that an ISP reveal information about a terrorist or somebody trading child porn on the internet. But since the feeling about MP3s is that they're "no big deal", the community is up in arms about this. This is a victory for ISPs in a way, because they're not being held responsible.
Now, does this mean that I support the recording industry? No so much, actually. I buy music so that it will continue to be available and to support the artists. I think the record companies are absolute idiots for fighting the internet, because it's the greatest tool since radio for them and they don't realize it yet. I think a new record label that wanted to use the internet for distribution could quickly do extremely well against the old-school companies, and I only wish I had the capital to get such a thing going (because distribution is not the only expense of a record company).
But, the issue at hand deals with the current law and those users who have downloaded excessively while knowing that it was in violation of the law. I support this particular decision, even though I realize how surprised the affected user(s) will be. I also support leniancy against this individual, since the rules of the game seemed to have changed after the fact. But now the new rules are in place and it should be noted by other users.
RP
If you can't deal with that, you need to a) grow up and realize the legal consequences or b) stop breaking the law.
There are tons of tv shows which are not shown over here in europe, which can not be bought anyway. You say anyone is loosing by us watching the, you are lying. If you say the law is being broken, we say that the law is protecting the greedy and need to be changed.
According to the associated court papers, the RIAA is claiming the right (as the copyright holder) to subpoena the identity of internet users from ISP's under the theory that downloading a copy of a copyrighted file is an act of copyright infringment. Apparently, demonstrating that the downloaded file was re-published is not necessary. Apparently the Court is agreeing.
So how long will it be before someone ties their /var/log/httpd/access_log into a perl script which automatically forwards a subpoena to the appropriate ISP demanding the identity of every visitor to a web site? I'm sure glad they all registered for Passport, it makes my job so simple.
After all, all of the files on my web server are copyrighted, and I am the copyright owner, and I know the IP address of the host which requested the file...
Can I get the caching proxy owners this way as well?
The thing about things we don't know is we often don't know we don't know them.
Your joking right?!?! I totally made up those exact words when replying. I can't believe they have been used before. Damn, I might have violated some copyright law by saying those words without the express prior consent of Comedy Central and As If Productions.
I think the only thing "lacking" here is your sense of humor. Get over it... Of course I knew it was a South Park transcipt. And I could care less about trying to "impress" a feable mind such as yours. I could use my Jedi mind tricks instead.
All too easy...
Snowdog
Given how many files were downloaded in such a short time, the IP address is probably a NAT'ed company with many employees using file-sharing services behind a single IP address.
If I were the RIAA, I'd dig -x on the IP address before getting the court involved, and make sure that finding out the identity of this one "customer" was going to pay off big.
...that the guy downloaded any songs unless the RIAA was the one sharing them? Did they break copyright to share these files, waiting to ensnare some hapless P2P user?
"Consider the lillies of the goddamn field."
Remember, copyright exists to create scarcity where none naturally should exist. If you copy bits, your copy is still just as functional and just as accessible as my copy (in theory, one would think a network effect would set in, whereby more copies would make the data more valuable - if left to natural courses, this would be the case - but copyright imposes unnatural restrictions on information - at one time, this could be seen as acceptable, when the only main way to spread information was via books, so that the information was tied to a physical form - but in today's world, that necessity is no longer the case)...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
...Does that mean they explicitly gave permission to the users to download those songs? I can see how this could make someone's head hurt...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
i still would like to know what difference it is for a radio station to play the music and me tape it .....to someone buying a CD and sharing it
...one is legal to copy and one isnt ?
...im going to jail
....when is corp america gonna finally get up to speed and quit fighting technology and provide an alternative within a reasonable price range consumers are willing to put up with
both are methods of mass distribution
or is it illegal to tape the song.... or pay per view movies..... geez
capitalism is based on what the market spends.... obviously the alternative to paying 25 bucks a CD for 1-2 songs seems to be worth the risk
8tracks then cassette tapes then VCR now CDs and DVDs
The double tax promotes corporate cash-hoarding and even mindless speculation in risky ventures. It's a hold-over from the Depression, when they wanted to encourage companies to hoard cash and retain a cushion against hard times.
The problem with the current plan-- to eliminate the recipient's income tax on the dividends-- is that it eliminates the wrong end of the double tax. How does eliminating the shareholder's dividend income tax discourage corporate cash hoarding? The company has to pay the tax whether it hoards or disburses the cash. If the shareholder pays the tax instead, the dividend will be proportionately larger (no tax bite removed) and subject to any state taxes and/or tax dodges affecting the shareholder. This also has the effect of eliminating multiple taxation on nested corporate shells. To be fair, dividend income from stocks held long-term should be taxed at the same rate as long-term capital gains, or be treatable as a basis adjustment rather than an income event.
Oh well, just my two cents plus applicable tax...
...when you're writing a game...tweak the difficulty of "Easy" to something [your mother] can cope with. -- onion2k
A legal expert stating that "freenet is used extensively by pedophiles" forces a freenet user to admit what? That their machine had porn on it? Maybe it did, maybe it didn't. To prove that their machine had it, the "expert" would need verifiable copies of that data plus the encryption keys to access it; given what I've read about the architecture of freenet, EXTREMELY unlikely. And even if these conditions are met, proving that the user knew about it would mean proving that the user somehow got the encryption keys themselves (again, extremely unlikely) and went to the trouble of decrypting the information. It just isn't likely. Read the architecture docs of Freenet. It is specifically engineered to prevent these kinds of invasions of privacy.
.
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
Thanks for the heads up regarding the differences in traffic analyzability between gnutella and freenet; I hadn't followed this aspect of the two systems, but am now intrigued enough to learn more.
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.